Obama Campaign Bundler Works At Bain, Had Role In Layoffs

Oops! Here’s a little something that must have slipped out while David Axelrod and the rest of the President Barack Hussein “kill list” Obama reelection campaign committee weren’t looking. The Obama reelection campaign blamed Mitt Romney for the failure of GST Steel company in 2001. A May, 2012, TV ad focuses on the Bain acquisition of GST Steel, and it shows workers at a shuttered plant blaming Romney and Bain Capital for the closure and job losses.

But there are two facts about this situation that the Obama campaign would rather that you not know.

First, GST Steel failed in 2001. Romney left Bain Capital in 1999. I can see how the desperate Obama campaign could try to blame Romney for the failure – sort of a “halo” effect, like the one Newsweek placed around Obama’s head back in May of this year. I know the Newsweek cover was about gay rights, but both the cover and the campaign ad are “reaching.”

Second, what is probably the more interesting fact is that Jonathan Lavine was in charge of Bain during the GST closure and occurrence of job losses. Who, you ask, is Jonathan Lavine? Well, it turns out that Lavine is one of Obama’s campaign bundlers. And Lavine is not just any bundler, he is a top bundler, bundling between $100,000 and $200,000 in campaign contributions. And he is doing all of this while the managing director at Bain Capital.

Further, we are all familiar with the story of workers at an Indiana office supply company who lost their jobs after a Bain-owned company named American Pad & Paper (Ampad) took over their company and drove it out of business, and then Ampad eventually went broke itself. Guess who was on the Board of Directors at Ampad – Jonathan Lavine.

Lavine’s being on Ampad’s Board of Directors suggests that he had a direct role in the layoffs, labor disputes and eventual bankruptcy of the Marion, IN, factory featured in the Obama campaign video. When asked about Lavine’s role at Ampad, Ben Labolt, Obama campaign spokesman, tried to ignore Lavine’s role. Labolt said, “No one aside from Mitt Romney is running for president highlighting their tenure as a corporate buyout specialist as one of job creation.” Labolt also said that Romney, as Bain CEO, would have been the one ultimately responsible for what happened at Ampad.

But a spokesman for Bain said that Lavine had nothing to do with the workers being laid off in Marion, IN. Alex Stanton, a spokesperson for Bain Capital, said, “The assertion he [Lavine] had any involvement with those events is totally false.” Class shows!

Perhaps the MSM will find time (and space) to report all of this, but I’m not holding my breath.

But that’s just my opinion.

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